Skavamson, Af. 
AMioais-- addeess \ocSoca 
Ads\caturel assonietion.-. 


Sat. | 


LIBRARY OF THE 
UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS 
AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN 


OR Ss UIBRARYS. 
~ “UNIVERSITY. OF ILLINOIS 
URBANA 


erie NOLS. — 


ADDRESS 


BEFORE THE 


AGRICULTURAL ASSOCIATION 


OF THE 


FIRTH CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS, 


AT 


Woodstock, September 22, 1887, 
ay 


Hon. A. BE. STEVENSON. 


WASHINGTON, D.C.: 
Press of Thomas MeGill &: Co., 1107 E street. 
1887. 


anid 


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ANY 
UINIVEROUY OF ILLINOIS 
URBANA 


Ait BSS. . 


FELLOW-CITIzENS: I desire to return my sincere 
thanks to the officers of your Association for their 
courteous invitation to share your generous hospitality, 
and address you upon this occasion. 

Notwithstanding the fact that for more than a third: 
of a century I have been a resident of Illinois, this is 
the first time I have had the honor of meeting and 

.§ mingling with the people who, by a kind Providence, 
-» have been permitted to find peaceable homes in this, the 
= fairest portion of our great State. 
‘<I bear to you to-day the greetings and congratulations 
of your fellow-citizens of that great county lying one 
Fini and fifty miles to the southward—the good 
<.county of McLean. Its history, stretching over but 
little more than half a century, savors more of romance 
Ythan of reality. The log cabin has given way to the 
5 commodious farm-house and the elegant mansion. ‘The 
iS rude appliances of a pioneer civilization have been 
' ¥ succeeded by comforts and conveniences to which the 
f- wealthy and noble of former generations were strangers. . 
Its school-houses and churches, colleges and universi- 
“ties, its institutions erected by the hand of charity 
Yand of patriotism, declare more eloquently than can 
any poor words of mine that the county in which I 
© dwell has not lagged behind in the great march of 
Christian civilization. 

And yet, what is true of the one county I have named 
is true of almost every portion of Illinois. It is in a 
marked degree true of that splendid tier of counties 
lying to the extreme northward of the great Prairie 


71 7S 


2 


State. The counties represented in your Association 
constitute a Congressional district which, in fertility, 
wealth, and beauty, is second to none in this broad Re- | 
public. 

All Europe is arming to-day for a great conflict, 
which the diplomacy of her ablest statesmen cannot 
longer postpone. ‘The inevitable result to the people 
will be still heavier burdens, taxation to the limit of 
endurance, national bankruptcy, and ruin. 

In this favored land we have peace. No rumors of 
threatening conflict disturb our slumbers. Our great 
workshops are engaged in the manufacture of imple- 
ments of husbandry, and not of war. The century 
now drawing to its close will, asI humbly believe, wit- 
ness in its expiring hours the American people follow-. 
ing the peaceful avocations which are the sure forerun- 
ners of prosperity and contentment. 

I know of no people who have greater cause for grati- 
tude to the Dispenser of all Good than those I now ad- 
dress. ‘‘Truly your lines have fallen unto you in 
pleasant places.”’’ 

Fellow-citizens, my address to-day is, in the main, to 
the tillers of the soil. Your occupation is as old as 
the human race. In all ages the cultivation of the 
earth has been the only condition upon which human 


life could be sustained. ‘‘In the sweat of thy face 
shalt thou eat bread ’’ is the great law which knows no 
change. 


In the early dawn of history we find our race en- 
gaged in rude husbandry, in the valleys of the Euphra- 
tes and the Nile. From Egypt, the cradle of human 
learning, the knowledge of husbandry extended to 
Greece and to Rome. A few of the maxims of the an- 
cients concerning the cultivation of the earth may not 
be wholly without value, even at thisday. The poet 
Virgil says: ‘‘ The farmer may praise large estates, but 


3 


let him cultivate a small one.’’? Cato, the philosopher, 
said : ‘‘Our ancestors regarded it as a grand point of 
husbandry not to have too much land, for they consid- 
ered that more profit came by holding little and tilling 
it well.”’ 

Agricultural progress has kept pace with civilization. 
It is not strange that during the dark ages there was 
but little advance in this, the most needful of human 
pursuits. The sixteenth century closed upon our race 
arousing itself from the death-like slumber of ages. 
With the human mind unshackled, the triumphal march 
began, which has continued unto this hour. ‘The era 
I have mentioned, marks the earliest attempts of the 
people toarouse themselves from the torpor of centuries; 
and from this awakening of the humbler classes of 
Europe sprang the earliest attempts to improve the 
methods of tilling the earth. 

The first Board of Agriculture was organized in Eng- 
land in 1793, and by the comparison of methods and 
interchange of thought which it produced a new im- 
petus was given to agricultural pursuits. This was an 
humble beginning, but it was the earnest of better things. 
The publication of books and pamphlets on agriculture; 
the discussion as to the methods of fertilizing ; the ad- 
justment of certain crops to different soils ; the applica- 
tion of chemistry ; the improvement of implements of 
husbandry,—are the inevitable results of the causes I 
have mentioned. 

The meeting of the first Board of Agriculture in Eng- 
land in 1793 was the forerunner of the grand result 
we witness in the great valley of the Mississippi to-day; 
of that still grander culmination witnessed in Philadel- 
phia a few days ago, when each State of the Republic 
presented a moiety of its treasures, that the world might 
know what wonders the tillers of the soil had wrought 
upon this continent in a single century. 


+ 


It must not be forgotten that one-half of the people 
of the United States are either engaged in, or directly 
dependent upon, agricultural pursuits for support. All. 
other avocations depend upon this. The success of the 
farmer is the sure measure of success in all other fields. 
of human endeavor. Let the timely rains and genial 
sunshine but bring abundant harvests, and the coun- 
tenances of all the people are lighted with joy; the hearts 
of all are overflowing with gratitude. 

It is estimated that the wheat crop of Dakota will, the 
present year, reach the enormous yield of sixty million 
bushels. Froin the South, data of the most gratifying 
character has been obtained, indicating a measure of 
prosperity to the farmers of that section unknown since 
the war. While the yield of cotton will be large, that 
of corn, to which more attention is being given by the 
Southern farmer than ever before, will exceed the crop — 
produced three years ago by more than one hundred 
million bushels. You need not be told that the pros- 
perity which has fallen to the West and Northwest has 
in some degree been the good fortune of the farmer and 
planter of the Southwest and of the South. 

In a recent address before the Inter-State Convention 
of Farmers, Mr. Grady, the eloquent champion of the 
New South, said : 


‘’There are two hundred and thirty thousand artisans 
at work in the South to-day that were not here in 1880, 
and this does not include the thousands that are build- 
ing new enterprises. We manufactured last year two 
hundred and thirteen million dollars worth of articles 
that six years ago we bought from the North or West. 
In the six years following the Cotton Exposition, one 
hundred and seventy-three new cotton mills have been 
built in the South, starting one million new spindles. 
The South is witnessing to-day an industrial revolution 
for which history has no precedent. Figures do not 
measure it, and amazement is simply limited by com- 
prehension.’’ 


5 


With but few exceptions the States have established 
boards of agriculture, so that every possible facility may 
be afforded for the dissemination of useful information, 
beneficial to the farmer. A quarter of a century ago 
the Congress of the United States created the Depart- 
ment of Agriculture. Its chief officer, as I have no 
doubt, will in the near future take rank as a member of 
' the Cabinet. Splendid results have followed the estab- | 
lishment of this great Department. It is, however, as 
yet on the very threshold of its usefulness. What may 
it not accomplish in the future? 

With the wonderful improvement in agricultural im- 
plements, the life of the farmer is no longer that ofa 
drudge. Much of the hard labor once performed by 
human hands is now supplied by machinery. The 
home of the farmer has, moreover, to a large extent, 
lost its character of isolation. The accessibility of mar- 
kets, with the methods and appliances I have mentioned, 
render his position in life, as compared with that of a 
former generation, one of comparative ease. 

Let the farmer magnify his calling. Let him not 
forget that his responsibilities keep even pace with his 
great opportunities. At your firesides let your sons be 
taught that there are higher aims in life than mere 
money-getting. From the country home, from the 
country school-house, a power will spring that will, I 
believe, place our free institutions upon a firmer basis 
than ever before, that will, as we enter upon a new 
century, give a loftier impulse to the aspirations of this 
great people. 

From the farm-house to the great cities moves an 
unending procession of brave, energetic, young men, 
physically and morally equipped for the battle of life. 
From their ranks will be taken those whose voices will 
be potent in every department of human affairs. 

Fellow-citizens, I address you to-day at a point within 


6 


a few miles of the great sister State which forms our 
northern boundary. Following a southerly course, you 
reach the waters of the Ohio, having for four hundred 
miles traversed farm lands, groves, and meadows but 
little inferior in fertility to your own. Let me speak, 
then, of— 


ILLINOIS. 


Standing, as it does, in the very van of agricultural 
States, I know of no theme better suited to such an 
occasion. It may not be amiss if I recur briefly to its 
early history, and attempt to trace its wonderful prog- 
ress. : 

The first white settlements were made but little more 
than two centuries ago. ‘The daring French explorers 
and missionaries, Marquette, LaSalle, Hennepin and 
their comrades, planted colonies of their nationality 
and faith at Cahokia, Kaskaskia, and Peoria. The 
Valley of the Mississippi, including the present State 
of Illinois, remained under French domination until 
1759, when the inevitable conflict between France and 
England for supremacy upon the North American Con- 
tinent was settled by the arbitrament of war. The de- 
feat of the French by British arms, led by the gallant 
Wolfe, at Quebec, closed the struggle between Saxon 
and Celt for supremacy over the vast territory east of 
the Mississippi. 

British domination over this realm was doomed, how- 
ever, to sudden overthrow. Even at the period of which 
I speak, events were hastening, which, resulting in a 
series of victories as brilliant as that at Quebec, were to 
wrest from England her colonial possessions. While the 
Revolutionary struggle was yet undetermined, General 
George Rogers Clark, by authority of Patrick Henry, 
Governor of the Commonwealth of Virginia, with a few 
hundred brave men crossed the Ohio, and penetrating 


7 


the wilderness to the Mississippi, captured the British 
forts at Cahokia and Kaskaskia. 

Would time permit, it could but interest an Illinois 
audience to dwell upon the history of the privations 
and daring of the men who wrested from the British 
Crown this fair domain, and replaced the symbol of 
British authority with that of the great Commonwealth 
which projected the expedition. All honor to the mem- 
ory of the daring George Rogers Clark and his brave 
comrades, who on the 4th day of July, 1778, wrested 
this great territory from foreign domination, in the 
name of the Commonwealth which, six years later, by 
an act of generosity that has become historic, ceded it 
to the young Republic then struggling for existence 
among the nations. 

The act of cession by the Virginia Legislature to the 
General Government of the Northwest Territory out of 
which Illinois and other States have since been carved 
was in 1784, the first year after the acknowledgment of 
our Independence by Great Britain, and while we were 
yet under the Articles of Confederation. Three years 
later, by act of Congress, the entire domain north of the 
Ohio river was erected into the Northwest Territory. 

One important feature of the organization, as appears 
by the report of the Committee of Congress to whom 
was referred the subject of the cession by Virginia to 
the General Government, was that the States to be 
‘ carved out of its boundaries should forever remain 
parts of the United States. The bravery of her sons in 
the late struggle for the maintenance of the Union 
attests the fidelity with which [Illinois has observed the 
sacred compact. 

In 1809 Illinois, with its present limits, was organ- 
ized by act of Congress into a separate territory. Its 
entire area was then embraced within the limits of the 
counties of Randolph and St. Clair. Ninian Edwards 


8 


was, by President Madison, appointed Governor of the 
new Territory, and ably discharged the duties of his im- 
portant office. _ 

Our history as a State dates from December 3d, 1818. 
Shadrick Bond was the first Governor elected by the 
people, and under his authority and that of the Legisla- 
ture which soon after assembléd Illinois took its place 
amongst the States of the American Union. 

The village of Kaskaskia was the ancient seat of Gov- 
ernment. It was the capital from the territorial organ- 
ization in 1809 until 1820, two years after the admis- 
sion of the State into the Union. . It witnessed events 
fraught with deep import to the Commonwealth. Here 
assembled the convention which formulated our first - 
. Constitution, a Constitution which remained for thirty 
years the organic law of the State, and will to future 
generations bear testimony to the wisdom of its framers. 
Here convened the first General Assembly under whose 
auspices the machinery of the new State Government 
was put in motion. 

The streets of Kaskaskia are now deserted. Its glory 
has departed ; but it was the home of the men who, 
in a large measure, established lawful authority and 
moulded the destiny of the State. It was of this village, 
his early home, that the late Judge Breese, with deep 
pathos, said: ‘‘It was there I passed some of the 
happiest moments of my life ; and in her withered for- 
tunes and waning glory she wove a spell about my 
heart which, it is no shame to say, separation has not 
broken and coming age has but added to the potency of 
the enchantment !”’ 

The rapid immigration which immediately followed 
its admission soon rendered the selection of a capital 
nearer the center of population a necessity. ‘The com- 
missioners designated by the Legislature for this purpose, 
having in view the possible flow of emigration northward, 


9 


chose a spot for the new location one hundred and forty 
miles north of the Ohio river, to which was given the 
name of Vandalia, then a wilderness, but now a beauti- 
ful and prosperous city and the home of a people who 
in public spirit and enterprise take high rank in the 
Commonwealth. 

Here transpired events which left a lasting impression 
upon the State. From this place, after a bitter and pro- 
tracted struggle, went forth the popular fiat that [li- 
nois should remain forever free. Here was projected 
the construction of the Illinois and Michigan Canal, an 
enterprise which was the file-leader of the many which 
have in later years so signally aided in the development 
and in the commercial prosperity of the State. Here, 
at the bar and in the halls of legislation, met the intel- 
lectual giants of the infant Commonwealth—Breese, 
Caton, Trumbull, Stuart, Browning, Logan, McDougal, 
McClernand, Shields, Baker, Hardin, Douglas, Lin- 
coln—men whose memories are cherished not by Illi- 
noisans alone, but whose names and fame have become ~ 
a part of our Nation’s heritage. 

During the two decades which followed the location 
of the capital at Vandalia the population of the State 
increased to four hundred and seventy-six thousand. 
The drift of emigration was to the Wabash, to the San- 
gamon, to the Vermilion, to the Military Tract, to the 
rich lands drained by the Kankakee and the Fox, and 
to the grand prairies stretching northward and west- 
ward to Wisconsin and the Mississippi. 

This was, indeed, the promised land, which the travel- 
stained immigrant might not only view, but enter. 
These blooming prairies, untouched by plow, untrod 
by human foot, were now to become the abiding places 
of men. From New England, from the banks of the 
Mohawk and the Hudson, from the Susquehanna and 
the Schuylkill, from the beautiful valley of the Shenan- 


10 


doah, and the States lying to its west and southward, 
from Ireland and the ‘‘Fatherland,’’ came the men 
and the women whose hands and brains were to be 
such wonderful factors in moulding the destiny of the 
State. 

In 1840 Springfield became the seat of Government. 
Then a village of but a few hundred, it is now a splendid 
city, and an honor tothe Commonwealth. Its influence, 
political and commercial, is not confined to State limits. 
Its nearness to the geographical center of the State; its 
accessibility, and the erection of a superb State House, 
render the present location, for our day at least, per- 
manent. a 

Fellow citizens, possibly I may weary you with de- 
tails, and yet I can hardly conceive of a subject fraught 
with deeper interest to Illinoisans than the history of 
the unparalleled development, of the matchless progress, 
of this great Commonwealth. 

Sixty-nine years ago, with a population of but forty 

thousand souls, it became a State of the American Re- 
public. At the time of its admission to the Union its 
sparse settlements were mainly in the Mississippi bot- 
tom. A single county, stretching three hundred miles 
to the northward, included what is now the city of 
Chicago, and in fact the entire central and northern 
portions of the State. 
. The habits of the people were simple, their wants 
few. Barter, in a large measure, supplied the place of 
a medium of exchange. . Commerce, in so far as it had 
an existence with the outer world, was by wagons 
across the Alleghanies, and by flat-boats down the Ohio 
and the Mississippi. ‘The log cabin furnished protec- 
tion to the pioneer from the winter’sstorm. With rude 
implements of his own construction he cultivated his 
fields, and with his rifle defended his loved ones from 
the incursions of the savage. 


11 


At the time of its admission there were but twenty- 
three post offices within the limits of the entire State; 
and it is interesting to note that but eight of the original 
number are now in existence. There was not a post 
office within two hundred and fifty miles of the spot 
upon which we are assembled. At the period isidicated, 
and for years afterwards, the frontiersman regarded him- 
self as especially favored if located within twenty-five 
miles of a post-office. ‘The mails reached the settle- 
ments weekly or monthly upon horseback and by stage 
coach. ‘'wenty-five cents was the postage upon a single 
letter. The log cabin, with its puncheon floor, supplied 
the double purpose of a temple of learning and a place 
for public worship. Articles of apparel for both sexes, 
with but few exceptions, were of home manufacture. 
Railroads, colleges, and universities were unknown. 
Less than ten thousand persons within the entire State 
were engaged in agricultural pursuits. Chicago had no 
place upon the map. As late even as 1822 it is referred 
to in Morse’s Gazetteer as ‘‘a village of Pike county, 
situated upon Lake Michigan, and containing a dozen 
houses.”’ | 

I have given but a feeble sketch of the Common- 
wealth, as it emerged from its territorial existence and 
took its place among the States. It must not be for- 
gotten that its career began under the guidance of men 
of no ordinary type. ‘The framers of its organic law 
and establishers of its civil polity builded wiser than 
they knew. The foundations, both for the present and 
future, were laid broad and deep. ‘To Edwards, Bond, 
Thomas, McLean, Cook, Coles, Kane, and their associ- 
ates is due a debt of lasting gratitude from millions who 
‘to-day are the beneficiaries of their patriotism and fore- 
sight. 

Fellow-citizens, less than three-score years and ten— 
the period of a single life—have passed since Illinois 
became a State. What has been accomplished ? 


12 


Eighty-seven additional counties have been created. 
From the southern line of Wisconsin to the Ohio river; 
from Indiana, stretching westward to the Mississippi, 
the prairies have been made to blossom as the rose. 
From forty thousand the population has increased to 
nearly four million souls. Within a fraction of fifteen 
million acres are in actual cultivation. The products 
of Illinois farms for the year 1886 were twenty-seven 
million five hundred and sixty thousand bushels of 
wheat. Eight and a half million acres produced for 
the year 1886 near two hundred and seventy million 
bushels of corn. ‘The railroads that traverse our State 
and the vessels that whiten our waters carry our pro- 
duce to the markets of the world. The merchant 
princes of the nation dwell by the lake where, a single 
lifetime ago, stood the hamlet with but a handful of 
population—now the wonderful city—in population 
and wealth ranking third upon the continent. The 
business exchanges of our people with each other and 
with the world are effected by means of more than six 
hundred banks, with an aggregate capital of more than 
sixty millions of dollars. Within the limits of the 
State are ten thousand miles of railroads, an excess of two 
thousand miles over the great Stateof New York. The 
weekly mails by horseback and stagecoach are things 
of the past. There are now two thousand and eighty 
post offices within the borders of our State, and five 
hundred postal clerks traverse it with railroad speed 
to meet the requirements of the commercial and social 
life of its people. The fiscal year just closed shows an 
excess of more than three hundred thousand dollars of 
receipts over expenditures of the postal business of this 
State. The contribution of Illinois under our internal 
revenue system for asingle year is twenty-three millions 
eight hundred and fifty-two thousand dollars to the 
Treasury of the General Government. 


13 


From the data I have given, a faint idea can be ob- 
tained of the wonderful material progress of Illinois 
since its organization. 

But this is not all. Let it be viewed now from a 
higher standpoint. What has seventy years contrib- 
uted to the intellectual and moral development of our 
people? In the struggle for wealth, have the claims 
of education, of charity, and of religion been forgotten? 

In 1884 there were in the State one million forty-six 
thousand nine hundred and thirty-seven children of 
school age; seven hundred and sixteen thousand nine 
hundred and thirty-five in actual attendance at school, 
being seventy per cent. of the whole number. ‘There 
were eleven thousand nine hundred and eighty public 
schools and seven hundred and thirty-one private 
schools in operation, in which were employed nineteen 
thousand seven hundred and eighty-one teachers, of 
whom twelve thousand eight hundred and seventy-six | 
were women. In addition to this vast number of 
schools, the State maintains three high-grade institu- 
tions, the two Normal schools, the Industrial Univer- 
sity, and the Illinois Soldiers’ college. Add to these 
the twenty-five colleges which derive no aid from the 
State, and what Commonwealth offers better opportuni- 
ties to its children for education than Hlinois? It is 
the glory of our State that the erection of school houses, 
academies, and universities has kept pace with the 
wants and aspirations of our people. The cousumma- 
_tion our eyes have beheld is the result of the generous 
policy of the early legislators in providing a fund for 
the support of common schools. 

But little less than four thousand unfortunates are 
daily provided for and ministered unto in the different 
charitable institutions of our State. The munificent 
appropriations annually made by the Legislature for the 
maintenance of our educational and charitable insti- 


14 


tutions are sure indications that the loftier impulses 
of our people have not been blunted by material pros- 
perity. Nor have the claims of patriotism been for- 
gotten. To her imperishable honor be it said, that 
Illinois, has with a generous hand provided homes for 
the sons and daughters of her fallen heroes. 

Time will not permit me to speak of the wonderful 
influence Illinois has exerted upon the affairs of the 
nation. The heroism of her sons, the tender devotion 
and the gentle ministrations of her daughters, during 
the struggle for the Union have become a part of the 
nation’s history. 

To the Supreme Court of the United States Illinois 
has given the able and spotless jurist, David Davis; to 
the Senate, the matchless debater, Douglas; to the cap- 
taincy of her armies, in the greatest struggle known to 
history, the incomparable soldier, Grant; to the presi- 
dency of the United States, the liberator and martyr, 
Lincoln. 

Fellow-citizens, I have spoken of Illinois, of its won- 
derful progress, of its matchless achievements, and 
have endeavored dimly to foreshadow its splendid fu- 
ture. But the occasion is auspicious for some allusion 
to the great Republic of which Illinois is but a compo- 
nent part. 

But five days have elapsed since the commemoration 
of the first centennial of the Government of the United 
States. Buta single century has passed since the con- 
vention of the Colonies; at Philadelphia, promulgated 
the Constitution, which, after ratification, became the 
bond of Union of the States and of the American people. 
In 1787 our fathers established the Government of the 
United States, and gave it a place amongst the nations 
of the earth. To-day our eyes behold what a single 
century has accomplished. 

What a commentary upon the work of the sages who 


15 

founded this Government is the fact that fourteen Cen- 
tral and South American Republics have modeled their 
Constitutions after that of the United States. The rep- 
resentatives of these foreign Governments, a few days 
ago, at our Centennial.Commemoration at Philadelphia, 
bore earnest testimony to the value of our Federal Con- 
stitution, and to the prosperity and happiness it had 
brought to millions of freemen beyond our domain. 

The population of Illinois to-day exceeds that of the 
United States at the time of the adoption of the Federal 
Constitution. : 

Twenty-five States have been added to the American 
Union. Eighty-four years ago President Jefferson, for 
fifteen millions of dollars, purchased from France the 
Louisiana Territory—now the great Valley of the Mis- 
sissippi, dotted over with beautiful cities, and teeming 
with a busy population—itself a mighty empire. ‘The 
purchase of the Louisiana Territory will remain forever 
the imperishable monument to the far-seeing statesman- 
ship of Livingston, Monroe and Jefferson. 

The century just closed has witnessed the population 
of three millions swollen into sixty millions of souls. 
Noting as we do this marvelous increase, we ‘are con- 
fronted with the serious inquiry, How are the teeming 
millions of the coming centuries to be sustained? 
Exclusive of Alaska, the area of the United States is 
two million nine hundred and seventy thousand square 
miles. Of this area it is estimated that there are one 
million seven hundred and fifty thousand square miles 
of arable land. 

Eight years ago, after feeding over fifty millions of 
population, two hundred and eighty million bushels of 
grain were exported. ‘The food crops of that year were 
produced on less than one-ninth of our arable lands. 
Edward Atkinson, than whom there is no better au- 
thority, says: ‘‘ Where we now support fifty million peo- 


16 


ple one hundred million could be sustained, without 
increasing the area of a single farm or adding one to 
their number, by merely bringing our product up to 
our average standard of reasonably good agriculture; 
and there might remain for export twice the quantity 
we now send abroad to feed the hungry in foreign 
lands.’’ Both Mr. Atkinson and Rev. Dr. Strong, to 
whom I am indebted for these estimates, concur in the 
conclusion that the mighty generations of the future 
can, to almost an unlimited extent, be maintained upon 
this generous soil. | 

During the decade immediately preceding our last 
national census seven hundred and thirty-two million | 
dollars of the precious metals were produced in the 
United States. In mineral products ours take the 
lead of all the nations of the earth. Thousands of 
square miles of mineral wealth are yet wholly untouched. 
Dr. Strong has beautifully said: ‘‘When storing away 
the fuel for the ages God. knew the place and the work 
to which He had appointed us, and gave us twenty 
times as much of this concrete power as to all of the 
nations of Europe. Among the nations ours is the 
youngest, the Benjamin, and, Benjamin-like, we have 
received a five-fold portion. Surely He hath not dealt 
so with any people.”’ 

In 1807 the first steamboat ascended the Hudson 
River; and now, at the end of a single lifetime from 
this first experiment, our rivers and lakes whiten with 
our commerce. But fifty-five years have passed since 
the construction of the first mile of railroad upon this 
continent and the close of the first century since the 
promulgation of our Federal compact witnesses in the 
United States over one hundred and thirty-one thou- 
sand miles of railroad. And thus by this, the grandest 
achievement of the century, not only are the energies 
of our people aroused and quickened, large additions 


17 


made to the aggregate of our individual and national 
wealth, but this mighty brotherhood of States, stretch- 
ing from ocean to ocean, from the lakes to the gulf, 
are bound together, as I trust in God, by indissoluble 
bands of iron. 

In 1804, by direction of President Jefferson, Lewis 
and Clark, with a small detachment of soldiers and 
guides, started overland for the Pacific Ocean. So far 
as is known they were the first white men who crossed 
the plains. The greater portion of the journey was 
made upon mules; and when returning, by descending a 
tributary of the Missouri and the latter river to the 
border. Some idea may be formed of the hardships 
and perils of this expedition when it is remembered. 
that almost three years elapsed from its beginning to 
its close. No tidings came from the little band, and 
they had long been given up for dead, when they re- 
turned with stirring accounts of hairbreadth escapes 
and of the wonderful countries they had discovered. 

Now, when eighty-three years have passed, the trav- 
eler from the same starting point, with but little danger 
or fatigue, can, by means of the great trans-continental ~ 
railways, reach the Pacific coast and return home in 
safety, having traveled as far and beheld greater won- 
ders in a single month than did Lewis and Clark in the 
famous expedition which has made their names im- 
mortal. . 

At the first inauguration of President Washington 
there were but seventy-five post offices in the United . 
States. Now there are more than fifty-five thousand. 
The revenues of this Department alone for the last fiscal 
year were forty-eight and a half million dollars; and I 
am gratified to be able to state to you that, notwithstand- 
ing the recent acts of Congress deducting one-third from 
the rate of postage, the postal branch of the Govern- 
ment will by the close of the fiscal year be again self- 
sustaining, 


18 


Within the twenty-two years immediately preceding 
the close of the last fiscal year the enormous sum of 
fifteen hundred millions of dollars of our public debt 
has been paid. ‘The receipts from all sources into the 
Federal Treasury for the last fiscal year were three 
hundred and seventy-one million four hundred thou- 
sand dollars. f 

The population of Dakota is twelve times as great as 
was that of Illinois when admitted into the Union. 

From the Patent Office at Washington thirty-nine 
thousand patents were issued during the past year. 

The data I have hurriedly given, furnishes but a faint 
idea of the marvelous progress and development of our 
country during the first century of its existence. 

The first line of telegraph was constructed in 1844, 
but even now what a revolution has it wrought in the 
social and commercial relations of the nations of the 
earth. 

Fellow citizens, what has been accomplished in the 
century now closed, is before us. But our Republic, as 
compared with the nations of Europe, is as yet in its 
infancy. What may not be its future? As the genera- 
tions of men come and go, as new light dawns upon the 
human intellect, as new discoveries are made in science, 
new inventions in mechanics, our resources fully devel- 
oped, our mineral treasures brought from their hiding- 
places and added to the aggregate wealth of the world ; 
as the vast plains and forests and prairies of the West 
are utilized by man, what visions of beauty will meet 
the eyes of those who witness the close of the second 
century of the life of this Republic ! As it was permitted 
the great leader of Israel to view, but not enter, the 
promised land, so may we, with the eye of faith and in 
the light of past history, see this favored land, as it shall 
appear when another century shall have added to its 
population, its treasures and its beauty. State after 
State will have sprung into being; cities yet unborn 


19 

will be the marts of busy trade ; vessels laden with the 
commerce of the world will cover our majestic waters ; 
plains and forests will have been made to bloom as the 
rose ; the railroads and the telegraph will have wrought 
wonders in the development of wealth, and in the social 
elevation of this great people. From ocean toocean, from 
lake to gulf, from field and city, everywhere, will be heard 
the busy hum of industry, everywhere be seen the highest 
evidences of civilized life. This favored land will, in- 
deed, be a gardenof beauty. ‘The realization will have 
been more glorious than prophet could have predicted 
or the wildest fancy portrayed. 

Fellow citizens, the traveler from the Old World, en- — 
tering New York. harbor, finds a city of a million and a 
half of population—the metropolis of the New World. 
Passing westward, along the beautiful valleys of the 
Hudson and the Mohawk, over the Alleghanies, within 
hailing distance of the great Northern chain of lakes, 
through the forests of Michigan, and across the prairies 
of Illinois and Iowa, he reaches the great Father of 
Waters—within a short lifetime the boundary of civiliza- 
tion. Following still the pathway of empire, he crosses 
the Missouri river, passes along the fertile valley of the 
Platte, and old buffalo ranges of Wyoming, jascend- 
ing by easy gradations the Rocky Mountains, to an ele- 
vation of nine thousand feet above sea level, then 
descending its western slope, he traverses the great 
Laramie Plains to the Wahsatch Mountains, thence 
through the wonderful cafions of Utah, within view of 
the great Salt Lake, through the Palisades of the Hum- 
boldt river, over the Sierra Nevada mountains, and then 
across the garden-like valley of the Sacramento—he 
reaches at length the great ocean whose waves kiss the 
farther shore of the Continent. From the Atlantic sea- 
board to the Pacific Ocean, -over river, plain and moun- 
tain, along a pathway marked by the loftiest evidence 


20 


of civilization and the lowest depths of barbarism, 
amidst gardens of unsurpassed beauty and deserts as 
desolate as Sahara, now above the clouds and again hid 
deep in the mountain, for four thousand miles he has 
held on his way towards the setting sun, and yet never 
fora moment passing from the domain of that nationality 
of which the stars and stripes are the symbol. 

For such a country, what possibilities lie in the future! 
A nation yet in its infancy, with one hundred and thirty- 
one thousand miles of railroads ; with sixty millions of |: 
people, and an area far greater than that of Rome when: 
she was mistress of the world ! 

From the early morning of history, the pathway of 
civilization has been Westward. 

‘“ Westward the star of empire takes its way— 
The first four acts already passed ; 


The fifth shall close the drama of the day— 
Time’s noblest and the last !”’ 


One thought more. I believe that the settlement of 
our controversies with England, by arbitration at Geneva, 
is the beginning of anewera in the world. Long before 
another century shall have elapsed, international courts 
will have been established for the adjustment of con- 
troversies amongst the nations ; and war will be known 
only asa relic of the barbarism of the ages gone by. 
The laws that govern nations, as well as those that gov- 
ern men, will be founded upon the principles of eternal 
justice. Intellect and conscience will rule, and the 
reign of brute force shall forever have ceased. 

Then, indeed, will the prediction be fulfilled, that the 
sword should be turned into the plowshare, the spear 
into the pruning-hook, and the nations of the earth learn 
war no more forever. ‘Then, indeed, will the grand 
consummation have been reached, and the motto of all 
nations will be, ‘‘ Peace on-earth, good will to men !”’ 


